Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Public Sector. By Wendy D. Chen and David B. Audretsch, New York: Oxford University Press, 2025. 221 pp. 39. 95. ISBN: 978‐0‐19‐767944‐9

It was a pleasure to read INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR by Wendy Chen and David Audretsch. Within the pages of 10 well-written chapters, the authors take the reader from a historical overview of the role of the public sector in socially important innovation to a meaningful appreciation of decades of academic and policy thought about the manifestation of entrepreneurial behavior within an innovation process. Chapter 2 asks the question: Where did public innovation begin? The authors are meticulous in their trace that begins with the ancient powers in the Mesopotamian Region and with the establishment of the National Science Foundation in the United States. This is the most comprehensive such history that I have seen, and it offers appropriate context for the topics that follow. Chapter 3 addresses new frontiers in public innovation that have been brought about through digitization. All forms of electric information exchanges are described, in an evolutionary perspective, in a readable and understandable manner. Others will likely rely on this foundation to begin their own study of quantum technologies and the role of the public sector in its development. Hinting at the inevitable, namely policies to enhance entrepreneurial-based public innovation, collaboration is the topic of Chapter 4. It is touted as a mechanism for the exchange of information that is needed to develop entrepreneurial perceptions for potential government innovation. The authors make the case that government can advocate collaboration as well as facilitate collaborations in which it itself participates. The direction that public innovation should proceed to maximize the social impact of new innovative technology is the topic of Chapter 5. And the key takeaway from this chapter, again with an eye toward public policy, is that the role of government is to enhance bottom-up approaches for the creation of new innovations. This so-called democratic perspective eschews government picking winner and loser technologies. That perspective forms the scope of Chapter 6. In what might be called a forward looking perspective by the authors who come from different disciplines, an innovation ecosystem is set forth in Chapter 7. A hallmark of the strength of such an ecosystem will be for the government training of public entrepreneurs, which will require a culture change for the public domain. This view is set forth in a justifiable manner. Drawing on the demonstrated expertise of other notables who are introduced in Chapter 8, the authors offer a roadmap for how to increase an entrepreneurial ecosystem and environment that fosters public entrepreneurs. As expected, that roadmap begins with a change in governmental culture that would initiate incentives through organizational leadership. And, before a final summary chapter, the authors demonstrate their own insight by offering a detailed discussion of the challenges a government faces in managing an entrepreneurial innovation nexus. This objective approach to the arguments set forth in the earlier chapters is to be applauded, as is the entire book.